TOENISKOETTER & BREEDING BUILDING LAW FIRMS OPPENHEIMER AND SIMPSON, THATCHER IN PALO ALTO
October 2, 2000

PALO ALTO -- Toeniskoetter & Breeding, Inc. (TBI) Construction, which has built many of the most prestigious professional offices on the Mid-Peninsula, is building upscale offices in Palo Alto for two international law firms that are expanding their Silicon Valley operations. They are Simpson, Thatcher & Bartlett, founded in New York City in 1884, and Oppenheimer Wolff & Donnelly LLP, which has maintained corporate offices in Minneapolis for more than a century.

TBI Construction is building 30,000 square feet of offices in a two-story building at 3330 Hillview Avenue for Simpson, Thatcher, which is currently located across the street at 3373 Hillview. The Palo Alto office opened last September with 14 attorneys, including four partners, practicing in a wide range of corporate and litigation subject areas. The corporate practice focuses on mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance and private equity transactions; the litigation practice on securities, intellectual property, antitrust and product liability.

TBI Vice President Dave Musgrave said the design by Hoover Associates of Palo Alto communicates a California theme through the use of light colors, natural materials native to the state and high-technology metals. The entry will have a stone wall with a stainless steel accented staircase. Throughout the building, special attention will be paid to wood accents, fabric-wrapped panels and clerestories. Glass panels placed along the top of the clerestory walls will allow light to flow into perimeter offices and interior rooms.

TBI Construction is building 24,000 square feet of offices in a two-story building at 1400 Page Mill Road for Oppenheimer, which also is currently located at 3373 Hillview Avenue. The Oppenheimer Palo Alto office, which opened in March, 1999, is composed of more than 30 attorneys, including 12 former Graham & James attorneys practicing in the areas of intellectual property, litigation and technology.

Oppenheimer also wanted a clean, edgy Silicon Valley architectural look for its offices, and the design by Christine Laing of Gensler Associates in San Francisco includes light woods, glass walls, ambient lighting in all work areas and ceiling tiles with an unbroken, monolithic appearance. The reception area features limestone flooring that extends into an adjacent conference room with sliding eucalyptus walls that can open to join conference room and lobby into a large area for social functions. The fronts of the attorneys offices are composed of two patterns of glass. High-end cabinetry will be used throughout.

Occupancy for both projects is scheduled to be in October, 2000.

Toeniskoetter & Breeding Construction has built numerous upscale professional offices for law, venture capital, investment banking and other professional firms in Palo Alto, Menlo Park and San Francisco. Recent law office projects in Palo Alto include refurbished Alza headquarters in Palo Alto for Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Morrison & Foerster at 755 Page Mill Road and Fenwick & West LLP in Building 2 at Palo Alto Square. Venture capital projects include Technology Partners, Spectrum Equity Investors, Foundation Capital and TA Associates, and TBI Construction built Agilent's new 200,000-square-foot headquarters improvements in Palo Alto. TBI Construction has built offices in eight buildings in Palo Alto and in San Francisco for Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Northern California's largest law firm.

Founded in 1983, San Jose-based TBI Construction has completed more than $400 million in projects throughout the Bay Area. In addition to high-end professional offices, the company specializes in historical restoration and renovation, religious institutions, Multiple Prime Construction Management for public agencies and new buildings for TBI's own portfolio and for others.